Rather than comply with age verification law, Pornhub restricts access to Virginians

Smut giant Pornhub has blocked access to users in Virginia rather than comply with a new law designed to preclude children from accessing the graphic and often brutal sexual content on its site.

In a notification to prospective users Thursday, the company claimed the legal requirement — effective July 1 — that users provide proof of their age "is not the most effective solution for protecting our users, and in fact, will put children and your privacy at risk," reported WRIC-TV.

"The safety of our users is one of our biggest concerns. We believe that the best and most effective solution for protecting children and adults alike is to identify users by their device and allow access to age-restricted materials and websites based on that identification," wrote Pornhub. "Until a real solution is offered, we have made the difficult decision to completely disable access to our website in Virginia."

The smut company told users in Utah virtually the same thing last month after state Republicans took similar steps to spare American children from the content peddled by the European-based, Canada-centered company, which sees over 2 billion users every month.

Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin's office released a statement, saying, "The governor remains committed to protecting Virginia’s children from dangerous material on the internet."

State Sen. William Stanley introduced SB 1515, stating, "If we're going to sit here and just say, ‘Well, there's nothing we can do about it. It's the, you know, darn old internet,’ then we're abrogating our responsibility to our children," reported VPM News.

The law states that "Any commercial entity that knowingly or intentionally publishes or distributes material harmful to minors on the Internet from a website that contains a substantial portion of such material shall ... verify that any person attempting to access such material harmful to minors is 18 years or older."

A commercial entity that enables children to access harmful pornographic material is subject under the law to civil liability for damages.

Youngkin ratified the legislation in May.

While Pornhub cited the need to protect users in its rationale for discontinuing service to Virginia, it was accused further afield this week of illegally collecting data from millions of users.

Wired reported that a complaint, "based on a technical analysis of the website and its privacy practices," was filed in Italy Thursday claiming the site is "dealing with the sexual preferences of users" without asking for consent and likely violating European law.

A 2019 study found that 93% of porn sites sent user data to an average of seven third-party domains, reported the New York Times.

"This isn’t picking out a sweater and seeing it follow you across the web. This is so much more specific and deeply personal," Elena Maris, the study's lead author.

In Pornhub's message to users in Virginia, the company also references the desire to protect children from risk, yet the company has been accused on multiple occasions in recent years of hosting explicit videos of minors, allegedly uploaded without their consent, as reported by the New York Post.

In 2021, the company even settled a lawsuit brought by 50 women who alleged it had profited from pornographic videos published without their consent, according to Canadian state media.

The Free Speech Coalition, a trade association for American smut dealers, indicated it might challenge the Virginia law in court, as it has in both Louisiana and Utah.

"It’s not a matter of if these laws will be ruled unconstitutional but when," a spokesman for the group told WRIC.

Concerning a possible legal challenge, Stanley said, "I think the compelling state interest is the protection of our children. ... And I would rather try and have a supreme court tell me I was wrong then not to try at all."

Pornography has been shown to have a devastating impact on the minds of children and adults alike.

An Israeli study published this month in the scientific journal Body Image indicated a link between pornography consumption and negative body image and ultimately increased severity of eating disorder symptoms.

A February 2022 study published in the journal Psychological Medicine found that porn is "associated with the erosion of the quality of men's sex lives" — "associated with lower levels of sexual self-competence, impaired sexual functioning, and decreased partner-reported sexual satisfaction."

The Australian government found that pornography consumption by young people has served "normalise sexual violence and contribute to unrealistic understandings of sex and sexuality."

A 2014 study revealed that watching porn actually could shrink a part of the brain linked to pleasure.

Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!